A tipster just sent us the video above, which appears to show a (large, male) manger at a Manhattan Panera Bread location punching the hell out of a (small, female) unruly employee.

Our tipster tells us he recorded this video (which has now been verified by the company—see the statement at the bottom of this post) around 12:30 this afternoon at the Panera on Park Avenue and 23rd Street in Manhattan. At around the seven second mark of the video, you can hear the woman slap the man; at about the 12 second mark, he hits her back, hard. The tipster writes:

We walked in, in the middle of her quitting her job mid shift. She was yelling at a different manager than the one who hit her and was throwing some bags of chips on the ground, threatening to turn up in this bitch, etc. Really nothing I haven’t seen before or wouldn’t expect from someone who has to work at a fucking Panera all day.

Then out of nowhere white shirt manager approaches her and immediately gets physical with her, keep in mind she’s about 5’2 at most and he was bigger than me... He legit threw her down a flight of stairs and out the front door for really no reason, she runs around to the other entrance to retaliate and that’s where the video starts. You might wanna say she hit him first, but really he had FULL CONTROL over her the entire time, was throwing her around, I think she gets one slap in that was louder than it was painful, then he half punches her once, she spins, and then he REALLY FUCKING PUNCHES her. You can even hear me and my friend yell DON’T HIT HER just before it... I checked on her for a while after the cops left, she seemed ok, she kept saying he really got her in the ear mostly which I know stings like a bitch. She was bleeding a little, and had cuts on her hands but she seemed ok after the adrenaline wore off.

We emailed Panera, and we’ll update if we hear from them.

UPDATE: A Panera spokesperson tells us: “Today there were reports of a physical altercation between two associates at our Park Avenue South bakery-cafe. We have a zero tolerance policy for violence and worked swiftly with authorities to investigate. The associates who were determined to be involved no longer work for Panera.”